Obama raps Hu on human rights

A direct, public exchange about human rights in China capped the official meetings between President Barack Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao held at the White House Wednesday as part of Hu’s state visit to Washington.

During an East Room news conference, Obama indicated that human rights violations in China have caused friction in U.S.-Chinese relations, but he defended broad-based contacts with the rising international and economic power as essential for the U.S. and global stability.

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“China has a different political system than we do. China is at a different stage of development than we are. We come from very different cultures and with very different histories,” the president said. “But as I’ve said before, and I repeated to President Hu, we have some core views as Americans about the universality of certain rights — freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of assembly — that we think are very important and that transcend cultures.”

In the past, “I have been very candid with President Hu about these issues. Occasionally, they are a source of tension between our two governments,” Obama said. “But what I’ve believed is the same thing that I think seven previous presidents have believed, which is that we can engage and discuss these issues in a frank and candid way, focus on those areas where we agree while acknowledging there are going to be areas where we disagree.”

Reporter Ben Feller of the Associated Press posed his unusually blunt question describing China as “a country….known for treating its people so poorly, for using censorship and force to repress its people,” to both presidents, but Hu did not immediately respond. Both presidents faulted problems with the simultaneous translation.

However, White House officials later said Feller’s question was translated and Chinese officials had requested sequential translation of the questions and answers.

After another American reporter prodded Hu to answer, the Chinese leader insisted his country “is always committed to the protection and promotion of human rights. And in the cause of human rights, China has also made enormous progress, recognized widely in the world.”

That contrasts, however, with reports from international human rights groups that Chinese freedom of speech - and freedom to form political groups - is routinely abridged.

In a case that has drawn international outcry, Chinese democracy activist Liu Xiaobo, the 2010 Nobel peace laureate, could not attend the acceptance ceremony because he is serving an 11-year prison term for “subversion.”

Obama discussed Liu directly with Hu, a senior U.S. official said Wednesday.

“The president did raise Liu’s case. The president reiterated his belief that freedom of expression is not only a universal right, but that movement in that direction is in China’s interests and the interests of China’s development,” the official said.

U.S. officials also expressed some satisfaction and even surprise at Hu’s comment that China has failings on human rights.

“That was a very unusual statement from a Chinese leader particularly overseas,” one senior U.S. official said.

The officials also said more than half of Wednesday’s talks was devoted to economic issues. Security issues predominated at the small dinner Hu attended at the White House on Tuesday.